Although biometrics techniques such as fingerprint, iris and face recognition have made considerable progress, traditional handwritten signatures are still often used to verify the identity of a person, and handwriting verification has become an important means to verify the authenticity of the
signature, which is widely used in forensic authentication.
Researchers at Tel Aviv University (TAU) and Ben Gurion University in Negev, Israel, have developed a new software that uses smart wrist watches to collect wrist movement data from wearers to verify the authenticity of handwritten signatures.
By using an accelerometer or gyroscope built into a smart watch, researchers can obtain signature patterns unique to the wearer and difficult to imitate by others. The study's co-author, Dr. Erez Shmueli, said wrist-wearing devices such as smart watches or fitness trackers had significant
advantages over other wearing devices because they measured the entire wrist gesture rather than just a single finger or arm.